


There is No War in Ba Sing Se

by Kaylathebookworm



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Ba Sing Se, Blue Spirit Zuko (Avatar), Gen, The Dai Li (Avatar), Vigilantism
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:14:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24582892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kaylathebookworm/pseuds/Kaylathebookworm
Summary: Zuko hates Ba Sing Se, but at least it's a great place to be a vigilante. In his efforts to help people in the city, he uncovers a conspiracy involving the Dai Li and firebenders in the city.
Comments: 11
Kudos: 85





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Tbh I'm a sucker for Blue Spirit Zuko

In Zuko’s opinion, Ba Sing Se was a filthy, disgusting, nightmare of a city. Of course, he had only seen the lower ring, full of desperation, destitution, and refugees hoping for a better life, which he strongly doubted they would ever find in Ba Sing Se. At least they had ‘safety’.

They really didn’t.

The wealthier people in the upper and middle rings were content to go about their lives, walling off the unfortunate reality faced by so many people, who were crowded into what could best be described as slums. The Earth King and all of his friends in the upper ring provided minimal resources and even less aid to the poor and struggling people, which was a recipe for disaster. Members of the Dai Li, the city guards, did absolutely nothing to protect people, either, too concerned with keeping cultural order, and the rich convinced of their faux veneer of a safe haven.

What was left, then, was an ever-growing number of desperate, poor, and terrified refugees crammed into conditions that people shouldn’t have to live in. And desperation bred cruelty and violence.

While it was a terrible place to make a life, the lower ring of Ba Sing Se was a great place to be a vigilante.

Zuko ran across the twisted labyrinth of rooftops, taking deep breaths of the decidedly not fresh air, jumping over obstacles in his path. He kept his steps light and careful, trying to avoid waking anyone who may have been sleeping beneath his feet. 

He made his way to, from what he could tell, was one of the worst parts of the city, although, arguably, most of the lower ring could probably be classified as such.

This part of the city was a mess of seedy businesses and apartments in various states of disrepair. The streets were dark and twisting here, and made for a great place to get jumped. It wasn’t a place any self-respecting person would find themselves, which was why Zuko had come here tonight. He slowly made his way down his rooftop perch and made his way to a nearby bar. If there was ever a place to find information about the criminal underbelly of the city, he figured a bar would be an excellent place to eavesdrop. If not, he could always resort to running on the rooftops, but if he really wanted to do something, he needed information.

The bar was grimy, but it was full of drunks, and full of chatter. Zuko ordered something cheap from the bar and made his way to a seat in the corner, pulling his hood over his head and turning his good ear towards the rest of the bar, hoping to hear something useful. 

He sat there for a long while, sipping at his disgusting drink and listening to what the people around him had to say. It turns out, most of them were not great sources of information. He heard a lot of people complaining about their lives, their terrible jobs, their poor pay, their family problems. He was seriously debating getting up and deciding that the night had more or less gone to waste when two men sat at a nearby table, sparking his interest.

Both men were large, tall and loaded with muscle. They were clearly trying to keep their conversation quiet, but Zuko listened intently, catching some of it. 

“Ugh,” one huffed, “today fucking sucked. This one brat actually shot fire at me.”

“Really? Most of those damned kids can’t even light a candle,” the other snorted.

“Can’t wait until we’ve turned in all those little bastards to the Dai Li. We’ll be rich as the Earth King. And, we’ll have cleaned out all those little firebenders. Do our part to take down the Fire Nation,” he snickered.

“You care about that shit?”

“Fuck, no. I just want my fucking money.”

At this point, Zuko was sure he had heard enough. Lazily, trying not to arouse suspicion that he may have been eavesdropping, he got out of his chair and walked towards the door. He was horrified by what he had heard. These people were kidnapping firebenders and turning them into the Dai Li. And they were targeting children, specifically. 

He shuddered as he crossed the street and climbed the side of a building, perching himself on the edge, with a vantage point of the door to the bar. He would wait until the men left, and follow them home. Tomorrow night, he could return, and follow them as they went after children.

Spirits, this city was awful. 

While he waited, he placed his mask back on his face. It wasn’t the most comfortable thing, and he hated that it partially obscured his peripheral vision, but anonymity would serve him well if he were seen.

People came and went from the bar, but it felt like hours before his targets emerged. Maybe it had been. Both men were stumbling, completely drunk. Zuko smirked. They would never notice they were being followed.

He hopped across the roofs as the men walked, easily keeping pace with their slow gait. When they split up, he followed the one that turned left, towards his side of the road. The less he had to find his way to the other side of the street from the rooftops, the easier his trek would be. 

Luckily, the man didn’t walk for long before stopping at a run-down apartment building, fumbling with his keys at the door. Zuko descended to the ground, hidden in the shadow of the building. When the man finally opened the front door, he followed, ducking into the shadows and letting the door shut behind him. He didn’t move until his prey had stumbled up an entire story, at which point he started slowly following again. The man ended up on the third floor at an apartment on the right. Zuko slowly sunk back in the shadows and back down the stairs, trying to shift his weight to avoid creaking floorboards. 

When he was certain no one had noticed him, he let himself out the back door and scaled the building again, stopping to look in the third floor windows where he expected the man to be. 

He found the right apartment, noting the window to himself before climbing back to the top of the building and starting the journey back to where he lived with Uncle Iroh.

Finally, he crawled back into the apartment and collapsed into his bed, exhausted. He guessed he had maybe two hours to sleep before he had to get up for work at the tea shop, and he cursed everything before he shut his eyes and promptly fell asleep.


	2. Chapter 2

He peeled his eyes open miserably, desperately wishing he could close them again, but knowing he had to get up. He had to work, unfortunately. It was always difficult for him to sleep after sunrise, anyway, due to his status as a firebender. 

Uncle Iroh was already up, humming as he made them tea and breakfast. How Uncle could still drink all this tea despite being surrounded by it constantly escaped Zuko. He was sick of tea, but he would still drink it if Uncle gave it to him.

He pulled himself up and slowly dressed, moving over to the window and letting himself be infused with the light of the Sun. 

“Good morning, nephew!” Uncle said merrily, in far too good of a mood for just waking up, and for being in this lousy city. Ba Sing Se did not warrant such a jovial attitude ever.

Zuko just grumbled in response, taking his tea and dreading the coming hours. He hated customer service with a burning passion. He was terrible at it, and he hated being forced to deal with morons for measly pay. They treated him like scum, too, not that he was unused to poor treatment, but he still despised it. They wouldn’t be so rude to him if they knew he was the Crown Prince of the Fire Nation, but it’s not as if he could just tell them that. He daydreamed about it, though. Every time someone clearly felt he was beneath them, he fantasized about letting them know exactly who they were dealing with.

Not that that had worked out so well last time. Not that it would work out well here. He would just be putting a target on their backs and lose the livelihood that Uncle was so proud of.

He sighed, poking at his food. It was so much easier to just be a wanderer. More stressful, sure, but he rather enjoyed the feeling of moving. This whole staying in one place thing made his skin crawl, and his whole being desperate for a way out. He felt trapped. At least he had his nightly adventures. 

“What’s wrong?” asked Uncle Iroh.

“Nothing,” he replied, “just tired.”

He was tired. He had barely slept. But also, he had no desire to tell his Uncle all his thoughts. They were a little too heavy for breakfast conversation. Also, he was pretty sure Uncle knew how much he hated the city. He hadn’t exactly hidden his feelings, and Iroh was adept at reading him at this point. He definitely knew that Zuko was going out at night, but he didn’t stop him.

When they left their apartment to go to work, it was still early, but like always, the lower ring of the city was bustling with people. A lot of people started working early in the morning, and many worked until late, just trying to make ends meet however they could. Zuko and his Uncle were just morning people, and the tea shop required early shifts.

Zuko sighed when they entered Pao’s tea shop, resigning himself to hours of misery as he started setting up for the day. 

Customers started streaming in way too soon, and Zuko forced a fake smile onto his face, trying to keep them placated. The whole time, he was fuming in his head. Here he was, serving ungrateful people their tea, standing on his feet all day, and just generally wasting all of his time. He had things to be doing. People were hunting firebenders in this very city, and here he was, not stopping them. He supposed they would probably still all be asleep at this point, but he would still rather not be here. This work was exhausting, demanding, and he was treated like dirt by most of the people he interacted with, including the owner of the shop.

Time passed slowly in the tea shop, and every time the door opened to reveal more customers he groaned. He would be much happier if all these people just left, so  _ he _ could leave, and also so he wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore.

When their shift finally ended, Zuko was exhausted, hungry, and irritated. He sighed, knowing he had a lot of work to do tonight. But first, he had to go to the market with Uncle, make and eat dinner, and then, theoretically, wait for Uncle to go to bed. Just three things. He was almost there. Just a little while longer, and then he could go back to helping those kids and running himself into the ground to do it.

They wandered the market on the way home from work, Uncle actually shopping while Zuko just wandered around in a haze, too busy thinking about what might be happening to those firebender children, and why the Dai Li was after them. When Uncle Iroh asked his opinion on things, Zuko just hummed his assent. 

By the time they had finally returned home, Iroh was openly shooting him suspicious looks, but he paid them no mind.

“So,” his Uncle prompted, “is it a girl?”

Zuko blinked and stuttered in response, “I- what? N-no?”

“Mm,” Uncle hummed, “I know you’ve been sneaking out at night.”

“Not for that!!! I have better things to be doing with my time!”

“Care to enlighten me?” his Uncle asked.

“Not today,” Zuko sighed.

Iroh dropped the subject. “Well then, at least help this old man make dinner.”

“You’re not that old,” said Zuko with a smirk, finally relaxing for the first time that day.

Eventually, Uncle fell asleep. Or, at least, he went to bed. He was probably awake, paying all of his attention to Zuko. He hoped his Uncle didn’t stay up all night waiting for him to come back. He shuddered, momentarily allowing himself to feel guilty before shaking it off. His guilt could wait. He had more important tasks to complete this night.

Quietly, he lifted the floorboard next to his bed, removing his blue spirit mask, his black clothing, and his dual blades. He quickly changed, equipping the blades and slipping the mask over his face before crawling out the window and onto the rooftop. He would’ve used the door, but it always creaked much too loudly, and was terrible if one was trying to be stealthy.

Carefully, he retraced his path from the night before, and made his way back to the apartment of the man he had tracked last night. The night was still young, and it had barely become dark, so he hoped that the man was still there. If he wasn’t Zuko would probably have to spend his whole day off stalking this man, which would not only be an incredible pain, but it would leave a larger window of time for him to go after more kids. He really didn’t want to leave this man to his own devices.

Thankfully, luck was on his side tonight. The man hadn’t yet left his apartment. Zuko descended from the roof to the window, and listened from just out of sight. This way, he would be able to tell when the man intended to leave.

He wasn’t waiting long. His timing had been a rather close thing, and the man left his apartment shortly after he had arrived. Zuko smirked, and began following from the rooftops.

He kept up with the man quite easily, helped by the fact that he didn’t seem to be in much of a hurry. When he had to cross the street to follow the man, he left the rooftops and descended to the shadows of alleys, still keeping to higher elevations when he could. No one ever looked up.

The nameless man didn’t go right after any children. First he met up with a group of friends, three others, in a dark alleyway. All were just as large and imposing as the first man, wearing some kind of guard uniform. They were smart, and knew that if they wore uniforms, people would tell them what they knew about firebenders, and they could get away with kidnapping children. They also knew that going after firebenders alone was a bad idea. Unfortunately, they happened to have at least a small amount of common sense.

Zuko shook his heart as the men headed down the street, and he followed. 

The men were far too happy to be hunting children. They joked and laughed as they walked, being way too obnoxious for this. 

His heart clenched as the group stopped and turned to a door on their right. One of the men pounded on the door with his fist, putting in much more force than was necessary. “Open up!” he shouted. 

After a few seconds, a terrified looking woman opened the door. “W-what do you want?” she asked shakily, intimidated by the men yelling at her door in the middle of the night.

“We’re looking for Lee,” one of the men said, a smirk in his voice.

“No one by that name lives here,” the woman whispered, her face growing pale in the moonlight.

“Ah, sure he does,” the man responded, “about yea high, black hair, golden eyes? We know for a fact that he lives here, so bring. Him. Out.”

“You’re wrong,” she said, her voice not sounding quite so sure. 

“Mommy, what’s going on?” asked a small voice from behind her.

“There’s the kid!” shouted one of the men, as they all started pushing past the woman.

She screamed, desperate to protect her child. “No, please! I’ll do anything! Just don’t take my son!” she shouted.

Her pleas went unheeded, and the child was dragged out into the street, terrified and crying. He was so young. He couldn’t have been more than eight years old.

“Please don’t take me away!” he sobbed.

“You, little firebender, don’t belong here,” one man smirked.

“I’m not a firebender!” he whispered.

“They all say that,” said one of the men, his voice laced with venom. He grabbed chains, and put them on the child’s wrists, grinning when the child cried out.

Zuko would have given anything to intervene right then, to stop them from harming this child, but he had to save all the kids. He had to see where they were taking them. He would free them all, including this one, who was being roughly paraded down the street. 

They dragged him for a while, reaching a quieter part of the city, where fewer people lived. The boy tried to struggle on occasion, but he seemed to realize he couldn’t fight them off.

The men stopped, approaching a warehouse.

“This here is the fridge,” one man said, “you’ll stay here with all the other rats until the Dai Li comes for you.

That would never happen, not if Zuko got his way.

One man unlocked the door, and they shoved the child in. As the door shut, Zuko stepped out of his hiding place, drawing his swords.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is when the action starts!  
> pls let me know if you liked it!


	3. Chapter 3

The men didn’t notice him, not at first. This, Zuko attributed to his own stealth, and the fact that despite having a few brain cells, these men were obviously lacking in the observational skills department.

While he still had the upper hand, Zuko struck. He took his right dao blade and circled his arm, slamming the hilt into the head of the closest man, who had his back turned to Zuko. The man dropped like a stone, ideally unconscious. He didn’t have time to check, though, because as soon as he had hit the man, his counterparts finally noticed the masked invader in their midst. 

They both jumped, and if Zuko hadn’t been so focused on the fight ahead of him, he would have laughed. He balanced himself on the balls of his feet and bent his knees, lowering his center of gravity and getting ready to move.

“What the hell are you doing? What did you do to him?” one of the men asked, taking a step back and pulling out a blade.

Zuko didn’t answer. He just narrowed his eyes at the man and his friend, who had a bit of a panicked look on his face, but pulled his own knife.

Zuko ducked as the first man jabbed with his knife, and spun into a roundhouse kick, which hit the man just under the ribs. Zuko had a powerful kick, but these men were large, and he took the force of the kick with barely a stumble.

At that, Zuko growled, and swiped with his left blade, slicing across the man’s right arm and causing him to drop the knife he was holding.

The first man cursed and threw a clumsy left hook, which Zuko avoided easily, only to narrowly avoid a stab to the chest from the other man, who had finally decided to join the fight. The blade nicked Zuko’s left shoulder as he barely changed the direction of his momentum and shoved his left foot into the second man’s knee, causing him to crumble.

Zuko cursed to himself. If he hadn’t been running on next to no sleep, he wouldn’t have taken that hit. He was definitely bleeding, but he still had two active opponents, and he didn’t have the time to deal with an injury at the moment.

He took his left blade and disarmed the second man, spinning as he did so and slamming his left elbow into the first man’s kidney. Not stopping, he kept spinning, and kicked his left shin into the second man’s face. The second man howled, holding his nose, and dropped to the ground. 

The first man was from his arm and clutching his torso, but he was still standing. But Zuko was done playing games. He put his blades away. As much as he wanted to kill these men, he figured that if he killed them, Uncle would be disappointed. 

Zuko threw a right cross at the man’s chest, and ducked under the right hook that came towards his face. As he bounced back, he sent his fist flying in a left uppercut, connecting with the man’s chin, and snapping his head back. Before the man could recover from the hit, Zuko grabbed him by the front of the shirt with his left hand and dragged him down, fisted his right hand in the man’s hair, and slammed his right knee into the man’s face with all of the strength he had. This asshole would  _ not _ be getting up from that hit anytime soon. 

Zuko grimaced as he considered the possibility that the man might not get up  _ at all _ , but shrugged off the thought. He didn’t  _ intend _ to kill the man, though, and if he didn’t actually check to see if he was alive, then he had no way of knowing if the man was dead. Therefore, he wouldn’t carry the weight of killing a man on his shoulders. His logic wasn’t exactly sound, but he didn’t really know what he would do if he had turned himself into a murderer, so he figured he would just ignore it.

Zuko shook the first of the three men, the one he had initially knocked out, who seemed to be waking up.

“Why,” he mumbled into the man’s ear, “have you been kidnapping firebender children?”

The man muttered something unintelligible, not seeming to understand what it was that he had been asked.  _ Shit _ . Concussed people were notoriously terrible for getting information out of. The likelihood of any of these men being of any use to him in an interrogation was very low, given that he had hit all of them in the head. 

He sighed. That’s what he got for trying to avoid using his blades. It was horribly difficult to use his blades in a way that he could avoid fatal injuries. Stabbing them with his dao blades would mean that he would have to give them some kind of medical treatment, or they would probably bleed to death, which he did  _ not _ have the time or the patience to deal with. He had kids to save, and these low-lifes were not high on his priority list.

Zuko dragged all three men behind the building, and bound them with their own belts. As far as he could tell, all three men seemed to be breathing, so he let himself breathe a sigh of relief.

Now. He had some scared children to return to their parents. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahahah sorry for the accidental 5 moth hiatus oopsie daisy  
> feel free to follow me on tumblr at kaylathebookwormwrites for info on fic upadates!  
> Also hopefully this won't happen again :0! My bad lol


End file.
